y'all may know this already, but all stars academy's batting cage is back and as the commercial says, it's bigger and better than before. (plus it's closer than queensbury.)
mike serbalik, the owner, reopened all stars, moving it to a brand new, 36,000-square-foot one-story facility - it's light gray/white, looks something like a big warehouse - on troy-schenectady road in latham, about two miles east of the latham traffic circle, kitty-korner from K-mart. it had been housed for about five or six years on the fourth-floor (88 steps) above the redbrick furniture warehouse in troy.
mike opened the new place march 5; there's still exterior construction going on, and the parking lot doesn't look finished yet (thought there is parking), but the interior is pretty much done.
i made a quick stop on saturday afternoon; the place was busy, mainly with kids. a brief tour showed me that all-stars has about 5 cages with iron-mike machines for hard and softball, with speeds that go from about 30 to 80.
it has another nine or so live pitching/batting cages.
the center of the academy - the part that draws your eye - is a infield with a small apron of an outfield that's entirely netted in. the bases appear to have the true, 90-foot dimensions.
the infield looks to be made of a kind of astroturf. the lighting is quite bright and even. when i was there a babe-ruth level team was taking live batting practice on the infield. i'd guess it's about 180 feet from home plate to the far center field wall. (home to second base is the traditional 125 feet or so.) i could imagine a game played there - infield hits would have clean true bounces; shots to the farthest reaches of the outfield would bounce off the netting.
i'm not sure what the rules are. i don't know if games are allowed. certainly infield practice and i'd imagine live batting practice could be done there.
and i don't know what the costs are. i just called information and was told the phone number there is 220-9140. you might want to call to check hours and costs. they also have a small snack bar there.
from just a brief visit, i can say i was pleased with what i saw and know i will go back - bat and glove in hand. hope to see some of you there.
